This invention relates generally to electronic communication terminals and particularly relates to electronic communication terminals that can be connected to the direct distance dial telephone network for communication with order receiving apparatus of any one of plural merchants.
Buying consumer goods, shoes, shirts, milk and bread, typically has occurred in different retail stores carrying the desired merchandise. A person drives or walks to each store, selects the brand, type and size shoes or shirt, etc., stands in line at the cash register and then drives or walks home. Many stores for basic human needs, such as food and clothes, are distributed among residential areas for convenience of the buyers. Specialty stores and large department stores often are centered in large shopping centers, which typically are less convenient to travel to, but the grouping of several stores offsets this inconvenience.
Catalog shopping alleviates the need for the buyer to leave his or her home and is effected by the different merchants mailing their printed catalogs to individual households. The individuals then can place their order in writing by mail or orally over the telephone. The national direct distance dialing telephone network is a great advantage in this latter regard because it enables specialty stores to mail catalogs to particular households across the country and receive telephone orders orally quickly and with the least amount of effort of the buyers.
The development of large complex electronic stock control and ordering devices has substantially increased the efficiency of stores re-ordering goods from manufacturers and distributors, but until now, these efficiencies were unavailable to the general buying public. One of the problems has been the absence of an easy to operate device or process, having a low cost, that can convey to many different stores the information unique to the desired goods or merchandise in a form acceptable to each store. Further, such a device or process must include confidential recognition data to insure the security of received orders, i.e. that the indicated person actually ordered the goods or merchandise, that the correct credit account or bank checking account is charged, etc. Such a device and process can be extremely helpful to people who are incapacitated and have trouble traveling to stores, to people who live in high crime areas where it is dangerous to travel and to people who live in high rise buildings and desire the convenience of doing their basic goods shopping from their apartment.
Such a device or process must automatically perform any complicated data entry procedure or step, such as entering a merchandise code, a merchant's security code etc. This simplifies and increases the accuracy of the device or process so that it can be used effectively by the general public. A complicated order entry process could not be performed by many elderly or incapacitated people and would be frustrating and inaccurate to most people, especially busy people who have little time to learn complex data entry systems. Moreover, having to learn a different manual ordering procedure or sequence for each different store would effectively prevent the usage of such a device or system by the general public.
Fortunately, some of the differences between stores already has been removed by the introduction of the universal product codes (UPC) in the form of spaced black bars printed on a white background. These codes are believed most prevalent on foods and have enabled the use of electronic check-out counters in food stores. The purchase of foods is one primary application of the device and process of the invention.